Two and a Half Gallons
by miss selah
Summary: Memories in the Mundane implied Inu Kag


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**_Two and a Half Gallons_**

Her fishtank is almost a foot tall. It has six sides, and one has a gouges that cuts half way through the glass. But it's not enough to make her worry. There are three pieces that connect to it, all black, and two more that filter and light it.

Her fishtank only holds two and a half gallons of water. But that two and a half gallons of water hold seven fish, all shades and hues of reds and yellows and golds. There are no rocks in her tank; instead, she uses tiny colored its of smooth glass that she gather herself at the beach the year before. There is a tiny plant, and a tinier house.

She walks past it daily, the dull hum of the filter a part of her, and she usually forgets it's even there. She feeds her fish beta food, because she thinks it will make them stronger. She might be right.

She hasn't turned off the light to the tank since she got it. She couldn't ever remember being afraid of the dark, but the first night the bulb went dead she had nightmares. At twenty three, that was pretty pathetic.

She walks past it again that morning, and she sees that a fish is favoring one fin. She unscrews a bottle of stress coat and pours a little in, and she can practically see the Red Dalmation straighten out it's fins and swim at a more even size. It goes up and down, and it runs in to the glass.

She needs a larger container.

She buys a Ten gallon for eleven dollars. She leaves her change in a box by the pet store door that advertises its cause. She doesn't stop to read the sign.

She sets up the tank when she gets home; her small collection of glass isn't enough to fill the bottom of the tank. She puts them in anyway, and watches in a quiet hypnosis as tiny pink shards of glass click against the bottom of her new tank.

_Tiny bits of glass sprayed over the battlefield, like the thousands of tiny stars they were. And as they fell from the sky, everyone made a wish._

She shakes her head, trying to clear the insane dream from it. It had been a dream. A very, very vivid dream. In it, there had been a slayer she had befriended, a monk she had endured, a kitsune she had mothered, and a hanyou she had loved.

But it was just a dream.

_"Kagome!" Inuyasha cried out from his far vantage point when he saw Naraku's tentacle tensing in to a grotesque shape as it prepared for another attack on the girl, who was already covered in tiny, whip – like lacerations. "Kagome! Run!" He cried out, forgoing his own battle with the minor demons to help her with her own battle against their greatest foe of all._

She watched her fish flail against the soft, tight stitching of the net, and she was surprised that they didn't hurt themselves. They were fighting a pointless battle; if she wanted them dead, she could have killed them. They were wasting their time trying to fight the envitable.

_Sango wasn't there. She had died the week earlier – killing her brother, then herself, in an ancient form of suicide magick. Miroku hadn't cried for her. . . he had died the week before Sango had. Or rather, Kagome assumed he had died. They had been eating dinner one night, and Miroku simply excused himself, claiming that he needed to use the little boy's shrubbery._

_He had never come back. _

She dropped in her algae eater first – he was the most prone to freaking out out of all of her fish, and she needed to let him settle before she put in the other fish. If she didn't, he would probably die of fright.

_Ironically, not counting herself, Shippo had been the one who hadn't died. Inuyasha had tried to protect Kagome, and he had caught the tentacle with his stomach. Apparently, there was a set number of the amount of times you could get a hole in your gut before you died._

_He had offered her no sweet and simple words before he drew his last breath – he was there one minute, and the next, he was unconcious and bleeding. Bleeding far too freely for even his demonic blood to heal him._

_Bleeding far to freely for any of them to heal him._

She turns back back to her bucket, where only six fish remain. She dips in her net, and swirls it a bit, her eyes out of focus and her mind racing about places from long ago.

_Kagome hadn't wasted much time mourning over Inuyasha. She thought that she would have, but when she heard Shippo's cry of terror, she heard a stern voice in her head that sounded surprisingly like her mother tell her to get up and use her legs – she had a baby to protect._

_Kagome had told herelf to mourn later._

_Later never came._

Five years later, she still hadn't shed a tear for the hanyou who had been her first love – her only love.

_She wasn't sure how they had known to come, but even before Inuyasha's body had cooled on the ground, help had arrived in the form of a whirlwind wolf demon and the phlegmatic Lord of the West, Sesshoumaru. She wasn't sure what she was more surprised about . . . the fact that they had shown up, just as she was about to flee with Shippo, or the fact that they had been respectful of Inuyasha and had paused for a moment to give him a silent fare thee well._

She continues to swirl for another moment, and then skillfully scoops, catching two of her three neon tetras at the same time. The jerk around for a second, but she has no fear that they will die. The aren't jumping fish. They aren't meant to leave the tank.

_"What!" Kagome demanded when Sesshoumaru thrust Tetsuigia in her line of vision._

_"It has to be you." It must have been a huge admittance for him. He, who had always wanted to extract his revenge for the wrongs done to his lands, and the blows that had been delivered to him through Rin._

_Even though she doubted he would answer, she asked him anyway. "But why do I have to do it?"_

_Sesshoumaru was silent for a moment, but because Kagome had the distinct feeling that he was trying to find the right words, she was quiet and unpressuring._

_"Because." He started simply. "You deserve to kill him mre than any one else."_

_Kagome looked over to where Kouga was thrashing about; without his jewel shards, he wasn't nearly as fast – but he was still faster than Inuyasha could ever hope to be._

_"You loved him. . . and he killed him." The words seemed to mean a lot more, when spoken by someone who preferred silence._

_"But I wasn't meant to kill him!"_

Her task with the neon tetras is done, and she drops the net in to the bucket unceremoniously, and she watches how they scatter and play right in to the waters hands.

_"You fools have played right in to my hands." Naraku informed them with a wry smirk. . . if you could call the grotesque reformation of his face such. It was twisted in a sick sort of pleasure, much like the kind he got from playing with them._

_He had caught Kagome, playing the same card her had when he had killed Inuyasha. . . His tentacle was wrapped around her waist, slowly squeazing the life out of her, draining her of all her strength. She stared at her hand, which was turning an interesting shade of grey. She commanded that it never release the rusty blade it held, and her grip tightened once more. She knew, even in death, she would never let it go._

In the bucket, there is a splash. She directs her attention towards it, and sees that her frog and her last neon tetra have begun to fight. She doesn't make a move to stop it, btu instead watches with a sick and morbid fascination with who will win and who will die.

_"Kagome!" Kouga cried out with rage in his voice. "Kagome, no!" He went to save her, but was blocked by Sesshoumaru. "let me go!" Kouga screamed as he thrashed against Sesshoumaru's might hold. "He'll kill her!"_

_He hadn't. But she remembers that Sesshoumaru had pulled one fist – his only fist – back and had knocked Kouga out with a single blow. She remembers that Kouga's eyes had flashed with something wild for a second, before he slowly slipped in to unconciousness, whispering a name as he fell to the earth._

_"Kagome. . ."_

_Kagome hadn't allowed herself to be distracted. She had seen all that had trasnpired out of the corner of her eye, but she had known better than to take her attention off of Naraku._

_"Would you like to be the next to die, my pretty Kikyo?" He asked, her leaning in despite the danger that the Tetsuigia posed. Or perhaps, because of it._

_"I'm. . . not Kikyo." She told him, coughing from the effort to talk with his tight grip around her stomach._

_Naraku grinned. "You know. . . I never actually got to kiss you. Perhaps I shall steal a kiss. . . in memory of Onigumo."_

_Kagome had lurched back in an effort to get a away, and her arm had swung forward, smacking Naraku in the face with the blunt of the blade._

_His skin had turned a sickly shade of orange, before the skin began to fall off in ruined pieces._

The neon tetra floats aimlessly to the surface. Though it was the obvious winner, as it was more ambidextrious in water, it has lost. The frog will leave to eat another pellet. She scoops the fish out quickly. . . she doesn't want her other fish to think that it's food.

_Sesshoumaru's eyes widen a fraction, and Kagome knew that it would be the most she would ever get out of him. "Your miko powers. . . they are merging with the Tetsuigia!" He informed her, as if she had any doubts of her own. "Defeat him now, Kagome!"_

_It was the first time she had heard him say her name, and she was surprised that hearing it on his lips had surpised her less than the first time Inuyasha had said her name. She supposed that it was because Inuyasha had harbored ill will towards her. Sesshoumaru had never really cared._

_Kagome nodded, and she began to swing the sword around blindly, touchng as much of his skin as she can. She drags it over his stomach, and watches as his skin turns orange in a thin line, just before his intestines spill out of his gut. .She is surprised when she doesn't pass out._

_Naraku's body fell, and his grip on her stomach began to loosen. She took her breath as if it where her first, and then another as if it were her last, and then one more as if it were her only. Her heart beat begins to level out after that._

As she hurries to the bathroom to flush the fish down the toilet, she tells herself that it's only asleep. But then, she remembers, fish don't sleep.

_"You killed him." Sesshoumaru informed her as he watched her stare at the cooling body with a quiet sort of morbid fascination. Sesshoumaru didn't stay long – only long enough to inform her of this fact. Then, he walked over to where his brother lay dead. Kagome hoped that he would draw his sword to raise him. . . but instead, he drops a single black pearl on to him._

_She didn't ask why he didn't save him. . . she knew that he had his reasons. And she was just jaded enough that it didn't matter to her what they were._

_There was a flash of pink on her left, and Kagome looked over to see the jewel of fours souls rolls in a slight circle before settling, whole and imperfect as it was before it had shattered._

_On her right, another jewel circled for a second before settling – a tiny black pearl that would be Inuyasha's grave, much like his father's before him._

_Shippo ran over and picked up the Shikon no Tama, and Kagome walked slowly over to Inuyasha's dead body. She picked up the jewel, and knew what to do. Straightening her back, she took a final glance at Inuyasha before she dropped the black pearl without a tear or a goodbye._

_She did whimper. Or maybe that was Shippo._

She comes back from the bathroom, having flushed the fish with out a tear or a goodbye. It was just a fish. . . it didn't matter much in the wide scheme of things. Just like she hadn't mattered much in the wide scheme of things. She rinses out her net with a few splashes in the bucket, and she hears the front door open. "Kagome!" comes the much more adult cry of Shippo. "I'm home from school!"

_"What are you going to wish for?" Shippo asked, his head tilted to one side as he offered her the jewel that her body had once housed. "Are you going to bring Inuyasha, and Sango, and Miroku back to life?"_

_Surprisingly, the answer was no. They had worked hard. . . and then they had died. They had been avenged, and if she were to wish them back to life, they would be no more than Kikyo was._

_And that was the last thing they would have wanted._

_So with that thought in her mind, Kagome picked up the jewel. She closed her eyes, and she made her wish._

_"I wish Shippo could live with me in the future."_

_Shippo's eyes widened a fraction with joy, and then they were gone._

She cups the water once more, and is surprised that the weight has changed. . . her tequila sunrise had done her job for her, swimming in to the net. She pulls the net out of the water, and it doesn't flail. . . it doesn't move. She is afraid for a moment that it has died. . . but when she dips it back in to the tank, it takes a deep breath of the oxygen it is used to and begins to swim again.

_They had woken up several hours later outside of the wellhouse. Kagome had been the first one awake, and she looked over Shippo with a bit of shock. His tail was gone, and his ears had dulled. He was taller now, maybe even taller than Souta._

_Her wish had made hime human. She wondered why for a moment, and then she realized that a demon could never live in her world, just as she could never really live in theirs._

_Shippo stirred, and groaned. "What's going on?" He asked her when he sat up. He looked over himself. "I'm. . . human."_

_Kagome shrugged. "The wish made you that way."_

_Kagome stood, and looked towards the well house. What would happen if she were to go in there, she wondered. Would the well still exist? Would hse be able to jump through? Would she go right back to the beginning of her journey, or would she be at the end?_

_A clink of glass made her look down. A single, shining black pearl glistened in the sunlight, and Kagome smiled. "Shippo, let's go inside." She told him, turning away from the well house. "There is so much I want to show you."_

It has been five years, maybe to the day. She had never marked it on the calendar. She reaches in to her pocket . . . she has them now, had given up skirts the day she gradutated, andshe pulls out a single, shining black pearl. It winks at her, as if to say thank you once again. She grips it with a smile and a tear. "Goodbye, Inuyasha." She whispers, before dropping it in the tank with her fish.

It floats down slowly, and it looks odd among the glistening pink shards of glass that she had recovered from the beach the previous year. But Inuyasha had always been the odd one out.

"Kagome?" Shippo asks, noticing her tears. "What is it? Why are you crying?"

He doesn't notice the black pearl. . . perhaps that is for the best.

"It's nothing, Shippo." She tells him, and smiles at her hard work. "Look! I got a bigger fish tank!"

"I was wondering when you would get rid of that old thing." Shippo commented, having to leaning down to be at eye level with the tank. "It looks nice."

She smiles, and he leaves. She won't tell him what she's done.

Her fishtank is is almost two feet tall, with four sides that have no cuts or scratches. It's so perfect it almost makes her want to grab a knife and just stab it, so that it has some imperfection. Three pieces connect to it, all wooden, and two more that filter and light it.

Her fishtank holds only ten gallons of water. That ten gallons hold six fish, all hues of reds and yellows and golds There are no rocks in her tank; instead, she uses tiny colored pieces of smooth glass she had gathered herself at the beach the year before. There is a tiny plant, and a tinier house that she has deemed a shrine.

But perhaps most important of all, there is a tiny black pearl that shines green when the water reflects light on it.

She doesn't cry when she turns off the light, and when she goes to sleep, she doesn't have nightmares.

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End file.
